Gunnar's Ground is a quest available to both free players and members. The quest replaced Romeo and Juliet. Players who have completed the Romeo and Juliet quest are still able to complete Gunnar's Ground and attain the extra rewards, but they will not receive additional quest points. The quest is about a dwarf poet that falls in love with a Barbarian chieftain's daughter but the chieftain doesn't trust outsiders. Players must find a way to let the daughter fall in love with the dwarf, and get the chieftain to accept outsiders.

Getting the ring

Dororan, looking very depressed.

Start the quest by talking to Dororan. He's the dwarf sitting alone beside the wooden fence east of Barbarian Village (near the fishing spot and the bridge). He starts the conversation with a poem and tells you that he's madly in love with a barbarian girl named Gudrun and wishes to give her a present. He wants you to get a gold ring for him from Jeffery in Edgeville (a normal gold ring will not work). He will give you a scroll containing a love poem in exchange for the ring.

Go north to Edgeville and look for Jeffery who's standing near the furnace. Members can teleport to Edgeville with an Amulet of glory or using the Paddewwa Teleport spell from the Ancient Magicks spell book. Free players can craft a nearby canoe. If you have the Edgeville lodestone activated, you can also use this to get to Edgeville. Or you can simply walk north into Edgeville from Barbarian Village.

Talk to Jeffery and trade the scroll containing the love poem for a gold ring. Bring the gold ring back to Dororan.

Dororan will ask you to engrave the ring with a text "Gudrun the fair, Gudrun the fiery". Click on the ring to engrave it, and show the Dororan's engraved ring to Dororan. He'll like it and will want you to give it to the barbarian girl Gudrun.

Promoting the courtship

Find the barbarian girl Gudrun. She's located south-west of the mine in the village (just a few steps away from Dororan). Speak to her and give her the ring. She will think that you are giving it to her so tell her that someone else sent you. She will ask who it is. Tell her it's from a secret admirer. Do not tell her that Dororan is a dwarf. She will then say that her father, Gunthor, the village chieftain, will not allow her to have a relationship with an outsider.

Look for Chieftain Gunthor in the longhall north of the village and talk to him. He will not allow his daughter to have a relationship with an outsider and will say something about Gunnar, the founder of Gunnarsgrunn.

Return to Gudrun and she will suggest that you ask her "secret admirer" (Dororan) if he has any ideas.

The poem

Go back and speak with Dororan and he will decide to write a poem to Gunthor, praising Gunnar to gain his favour. He will get stuck and will ask you for some help. The poem is a small trial-and-error game, in which Dororan hints for the correct words. The first choices you'll receive are all incorrect. After choosing one, you will be prompted with other different words. This happens for all 3 parts that Dororan needs help on.

The correct answers are as follows:

Stray

Threat

Swept to war

Gunnar's ground

Here is how the poem goes:

Our people dwelt on mountains steeped in lore,

A mighty tribe as harsh as any beast

Who then, in face of madness, swept to war,

The warlord Gunnar leading to the east.

This legacy of honour still lives on

In Gunnar’s bloodline, fierce to this day.

We sing the tales of battles long since won

And from his righteous purpose never stray.

But long is gone the author of that threat

And even rolling boulders come to rest,

For Gunnar’s ground is rich and fruitful yet

And Gunnar’s blood with beauty also blessed.

Now let these freemen from this conflict cease

And let this be the time of Gunthor’s peace.

Sending the poem

Dororan will then give you the completed poem, Gunnar's Ground. Go to Gudrun and ask her to read it to her father. A cutscene will start and Dororan will have second thoughts. Tell him to be positive and keep encouraging him.

Gunthor will accept the idea that Gunnar's war is over and that the barbarians should consider themselves settled in the village. Another cutscene will show Gudrun finally meeting Dororan and hugging him. Talk to Dororan to complete the quest.

After the quest, you can go to what used to be Juliet's house (near the Cooking Guild) and Dororan is now living there with Gudrun. You can talk to Dororan and ask for additional tasks to engrave jewellery for him and receive up to 32K experience in Crafting.

If you talk to Dororan after this quest, he will ask your help in carving words on a ruby bracelet (engrave 'With beauty blessed.' on it), dragonstone necklace (engrave 'Gudrun' on it) and onyx amulet (engrave 'The most beautiful girl in the room.' on it). If you agree to help, you get an additional total of 32,000 experience. Free players can engrave the jewellery even though they can only be obtained by members. Temporary boosts work.

Achievement

Transcript

This article on a quest has an associated dialogue page.Click here for a transcript of possible conversations encountered throughout the quest.

Trivia

An unlisted music track that plays during the cutscene where the player and Dororon spy on the meeting/

A player wearing the quest point cape during one of the cutscenes in Gunnar's Ground

If a player completed the Romeo and Juliet quest, they will receive no quest points for Gunnar's Ground and will be able to wear the quest point cape and perform its emote without having finished the quest. However, the Quest Completion scroll will still state that they receive 5 quest points for completing the quest.

The spoiler on the day it was released was "We tried to write the spoiler for Gunnar's Ground, but couldn't find the right words or a suitable pentameter. Come back tomorrow, when our writer's block has cleared." Pentameter is a style of poetic meter that simply means five beats in one line. This is a reference to Romeo and Juliet, as Shakespeare is known for writing his plays in pentameter.

When you choose the "I'd like to see him try" sentence while talking to Chieftain Gunthor, Haakon will reply with "Come here and say that to my face outlander!". He will say that even if you killed him before.

The music track unlocked during this quest, "Gunnarsgrunn", is Norwegian, meaning Gunnar's Ground. Many of the names of the barbarians in the quests are also Norwegian, such as Haakon (an alternative spelling of the Norwegian name Håkon), Gunnar and Gudrun.

Upon completing this quest, the Adventurer's Log will read: "I brought peace to the barbarians of Gunnarsgrunn, and helped a dwarf find love."

The onyx amulet inscription "The most beautiful girl in the room" is most likely a reference to New Zealand comedy musical duo Flight of the Conchords and their song entitled "The Most Beautiful Girl (In the Room)".

During the third part of the poetry puzzle, one of the available options the player can say is "tame the shrew" which, like the quest this one replaced, is a reference to a Shakespearean play.

The quest contains an oblique reference to the old Romeo and Juliet quest. The examine text of the love poem is "Laying everybody low with a love poem that he made". This is a reference to the lyrics of "Romeo and Juliet" by Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits. Talking to Kjell after completing the quest leads him to give other lines from this song, such as "..dreamed your dream for you..." and "...fall for chains of gold..."

If a player uses the quest's gold ring on the chisel, instead of the chisel on the gold ring. The game puts out a message saying, "You can't engrave a chisel with a ring. Maybe you should engrave the ring with a chisel."

If a player has completed the Fremennik Trials and does this quest, you will be called an outlander by Gunthor but you will say that you have passed their trials and can choose to drink to something.

When talking to the dwarf about Gunthor, your character just refers to 'he' without saying who "he" is.

Additional rewards:

After you engrave the ruby bracelet and talk to Gudrun, she comments that when she recited the line ('With beauty blessed') engraved on the ruby bracelet to her father Gunthor, of how the line took her breath away.

After you engrave the dragonstone necklace and talk to Gudrun, she says that she loves the dragonstone amulet and that she may have the dragonstone necklace enchanted so that she can teleport to Al Kharid.

Which is an error as it would had to have been a dragonstone amulet, and not a dragonstone necklace, if it were to be enchanted to allow Gudrun to teleport to Al Kharid

After you engrave the onyx amulet and talk to Gudrun, she states that she loves the onyx amulet, asks "aren't these things really expensive?", and that Dororan is so sweet for engraving the gifted onyx amulet with 'The most beautiful girl in the room'.